Para-Olympics Day 3: Medical Ethics.

Established in the opening ceremony the over-riding theme of the 2012 Para-Olympic games is the importance of science and it's ability to overcome disability. The flip side of this argument is that for all the good things each new scientific discovery brings they often also bring bad things. Take for example the splitting of the atom. On one hand this gave us the ability to produce lots of relatively cheap and clean electricity and provided the isotopes that are used to treat many serious diseases such as cancer. On the other hand though it gave us the ability to wipe out the entire human population of the earth in a matter of minutes - to literally become the destroyers of worlds.

These ethical dilemmas arise in all aspects of science but in the para-Olympics they are most relevant to medicine because all too often doctors - especially medical researchers - see patients as a problem that must be solved or disease/disability that must be conquered rather then as people. This attitude was shown at it's most naked and extreme during the Nazi holocaust of the 1930/40's when many of the people who compete in the para-Olympics would have been forcibly sterilised to prevent them polluting the gene-pool with their inferior children or cut open by Dr Josef Mengele simply to measure how they felt pain. So bad was the treatment of the disabled during the Nazi holocaust that it led to the drawing up of the Nuremberg Codes on medical research which although certain nations (Britain) seem to think don't apply to them these codes provide the minimum legal standard across the world. The next great scandal in medical research came in the 1950/60's when a German drugs company - Grunenthal - marketed a drug called Thalidomide to pregnant women across the world to combat morning sickness and aid with sleep. Within months (about 9 to be precise) of Thalidomide hitting the market tens of thousands of babies across the world started being born with severe birth defects. The most common and obvious of these were missing or deformed limbs but also included missing or deformed internal vital organs such as lungs. The drugs was finally withdrawn for the market in 1961 and nations across the world introduced a raft of much tougher testing standards that new drugs must pass before they are allowed on to the market. Interestingly though in 1998 Thalidomide was re-licensed for use to treat leprosy because in that case the risk of birth defects is much lower then the risk posed by the disease.

Today Grunenthal finally apologised to the victims of Thalidomide in order to raise the issue of medical ethics at the para-Olympics to counter Britain's Nazi-like fervour for the powers of science. Coming 55 years after the problems of Thalidomide first became known and due to Germany's Nazi-past the Germans knew that they would get absolutely hammered by Britain for this but they did it anyway. After all they are less guilty then Britain in the cover up because while Grunethal only apologised today they've been paying compensation to Thalidomide victims since 1968. It took until 2009 for the British government who licensed the drug for use to do the same. Britain's rather caviler attitude to it's responsibilities towards it's population are still seen today through attempts to deny compensation to victims of atomic bomb tests, asbestos and most recently the PIP breast implant scandal.

Also today there has the news that up to 10,000 people in the USA might be at risk of contracting Hantavirus after visiting the Yosemite National Park of Yogi Bear fame. First discovered amongst United Nations (UN) soldiers stationed along the Hantan river during the Korean war Hantavirus can lead to hemorrhagic fever which is also caused by Ebola and basically leaves the membranes of the human body unable to contain blood so the patient bleeds out of every orifice before dying slowly and painfully. However the US cases seem to be a strain that causes lung infections which is an obvious reference to the debate about restricting tobacco smoking. Some people say that this is being done in order to strip away civil liberties as Hitler did in the 1930's while others think that it's because now they provided universal education, universal health care and social security politicians in developed nations have simply run out of things to do to show they care about their populations so have start interfering with what we smoke, eat and drink to give themselves a sense of purpose. In all cases Hantavirus is spread by droppings from mice turning to dust and then mixing with the air of food before either being inhaled or eaten. Now the mice could be a reference to a computer mouse or it could be a reference to the rats that gave me and Muammer Qaddafi so many problems in two totally different contexts. The mixing with everyday substances could be a reference to the substances such as LSD the certain drug dealers add to the cannabis they sell to make it more potent. The dust could be a reference to how the properties of cannabis changes as it dries and breaks down.

Once you've managed to pick your way through all those questions though it becomes very obvious that the US outbreak has occurred because someone has chosen to release Hantavirus into the environment assuming of course that the outbreak has happened at all. In part this was done to build bridges with the Muslim world by demonstrating that the USA often treats it's own citizens that badly too but mainly it was done to raise at the para-Olympics that old moral dilemma - "Just because we can do something does that mean we should?" For example while I'm certain that homosexuality cannot be cured I'm sure that along with ginger hair it can be eradicated within in a generation through a comprehensive program of pre-natal screening and abortion although it's probably best you don't ask me about my views on specific ginger-haired homosexuals. This dilemma is particularly relevant to para-Olympians in the 3 category (cerebral palsy) and others born with disabilities because through science we have reached the point rather then helping them compete we could simply make sure they were never born. This is an issue that is particularly close to former US Republican Presidential candidate Rick Santorum's heart.

Beneath those massive philosophical questions some athletes today managed to compete to the best of their abilities without drama or scandal. Some were awarded medals other's weren't. Britain however continued to struggle to control the agenda for the games. This was done by trying to get cyclist Jody Cundy back to his intended purpose after he yesterday got tangled up in arguments about me and my grandmother's case. His original purpose was to act as a metaphor for Jody McIntyre an anti-student fees protester with cerebral palsy who earned himself global fame and a book deal after footage of police officers pulling him out of his wheelchair at the December 2010 Student protests went viral. Apart from re-opening the debate about whether those protests were state sponsored in an attempt to sabotage the COP16/CMP6 Climate Change summit Britain wanted to draw attention to the Jody McIntyre case to show much they understand disabled people and their rights. You see Cerebral Palsy which McIntyre suffers from is simply a condition that stops the brain communicating with the rest of the body. So while Cerebral Palsy sufferers may have difficultly speaking or controlling the movement of their limbs or physically twitch spastically which makes them look dumb there is absolutely nothing wrong with their brains and they can be as clever or as stupid as everybody else. So by beating up Mr McIntyre the Territorial Support Group (TSG) were simply celebrating his equality by treating him as they would any other able-bodied person. Now all we've got to do now is stop the TSG beating up able-bodied people.

Continuing the rouges gallery of Britain's state sponsored political protest groups an anti-climate change group called "Climate Siren" hung a banner reading "Climate Change Our Next Big Challenge" from the para-Olympic symbol on Tower Bridge causing the bridge to be shut for two hours. Climate Siren have only carried out one previous action hanging a similar banner from the gates of Buckingham Palace on June 23rd (23/6/12). However they appear to be splinter from the "Climate Rush" group who basing themselves on the suffragette movement of the 1910/20's has a broadly feminist ideology and along with Climate Camp and all of Britain's other anti-climate change protest groups suddenly disappeared in 2010 right about the time the government changed. Probably the most famous member of Climate Rush is a photogenic woman called Tamsin Ormond who after writing her autobiography and standing as a MP and losing in the 2010 General Election is currently telling any newspaper or magazine that will pay her about her life as a lesbian. This is particularly embarrassing for Conservative Party freshman Rory Stewart who spent much of his first term as an MP boasting to people about how he was having an affair with Ms Omond. Prior to becoming an MP Stewart worked for the Foreign and Commonwealth Office planning the reconstruction of Afghanistan which certainly explains much of the last 11 years. In their press release Climate Siren made specific reference to the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)'s "B1" model. Obviously this looks a lot like the classification system for para-Olympic events and was therefore an attempt to convince casual observers the para-Olympic classification is actually being used to send coded messages. The USA had a go at it yesterday by recalling a long list of serial numbers belonging to supposedly faulty Chinese made coffee machines. However so far I've not seen anything that makes sense to me as a code so I think people are just chucking random combinations of numbers and letters around to cause confusion.

Also protesting were the English Defence League (EDL) who sprung up in 2010 at just about the same time all those environmental protest groups disappeared. After meeting at Kings Cross overground/underground hub station the EDL were put on special trains by the police who escorted them to Blackhorse underground station in Walthamstow, east London not far from the Olympic Park. They then intended to march to Walthamstow Magistrate's Court which presumably they viewed as a bastion of Islamic extremism (well it's in an area with a lot of people with dark skin). Unfortunately they found their route blocked by member's of MI5's "Socialist Workers Party (SWP)" in their "Unite Against Fascism (UAF)" guise who were sitting peacefully in the street. The EDL were prevented from reaching the Magistrates Court but there was no violence although apparently one EDL member did get into a fist fight with an EDL steward.

On the Twitter front Britain's para-Olympic broadcaster Channel 4 has been asking viewers to take to Twitter to tell them what they think about Jody Cundy's sweary outburst yesterday. On one level this is just a broadcaster which likes to have a reputation for being 'edgy' assessing the public's attitude to bad language on TV so they can use it in future arguments with the broadcast regulator. On another level though it's a perfect example of how Twitter/the Internet can be used to farm people. By asking people to submit their views on a incident which could have many meanings the farmer gets to harvest a great detail about the way the respondent thinks making it easier to categories them. Obviously this is one aspect of Twitter/the Internet totalitarian governments are very keen on. Also Channel 4 has set up a dedicated para-Olympic Twitter feed which focuses mainly on British athletes and often clashes with the official TeamGB Twitter feed. The TeamGB feed is clearly written by someone with a great deal of knowledge about para-Olympic sport while the Channel 4 feed is clearly written by someone with a great deal knowledge about talking and entertainment. As a result there's a little bit of a Twitter feud going on between the two.

The final controversy revolved around TeamGB's favourite S6 swimmer Ellie Simmonds and her great rival in the 400m freestyle Victoria Arlen of the USA. Apparently Arlen failed to submit all the necessary information to the classifiers in time so was re-classified as an S7 with a lower level of impairment meaning that she couldn't race Simmonds. However Arlen appealed and was allowed to take part in the S6 race. Now Arlen's problem sounds an awful lot like the problem I had with ATOS/DWP in December 2011/January 2012 when they claimed to have sent me a questionnaire about my disability and level of impairment. As I didn't receive that questionnaire I was unable to fill it in so having not received all the necessary information ATOS/DWP re-classified me as having a lower level of disability/impairment costing me about GBP19/USD28.5 a year in disability benefit payment. To be honest when it comes to illegal things the Brits have done to me that doesn't even feature in the top ten. The USA's hope was that Arlen would beat Simmonds forcing Britain to appeal Arlen's inclusion on the race. However Simmonds proved herself to be a great competitor by sort of going "F*ck the politics I'm going to win!" and win she did setting a world record in the process.

23:59 on 1/9/12.